It can be used as a travel document when visiting countries in the EEA (EU plus EFTA) countries, Europe's microstates, Albania,[2] Bosnia and Herzegovina,[3] Georgia, Kosovo, Moldova, Montenegro,[4] North Macedonia,[5] North Cyprus,[6] Serbia, Montserrat, the French overseas territories, and on organized tours to Tunisia.

Only around 10 % of the citizens of Austria had this card in 2012,[7] as they can use the Austrian driver's licenses or other identity cards domestically and the more widely accepted Austrian passport abroad.

German names containing umlauts (ä, ö, ü) and/or ß are spelled in the correct way in the non-machine-readable zone of the passport, but with simple vowel + E and/or SS in the Machine Readable Zone, e.g. Müller becomes MUELLER, Groß becomes GROSS, and Gößmann becomes GOESSMANN.

The transcription mentioned above is generally used for airplane tickets etc., but sometimes (like in US visas) also simple vowels are used (MULLER, GOSSMANN).

Austrian identity cards and passports may (but do not always) contain a trilingual (in German, English, and French) explanation of the German umlauts and ß, e.g. 'ß' entspricht / is equal to / correspond a 'SS'.